Change
by valeriacullen
Summary: Bella decides she wants change, it all starts with a pretty boy in a coffee shop. Bravery comes in the smallest of forms.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Something simple, something different. I hope you like.

I don't own Twilight.

Change

_Change means that what was before wasn't perfect. People want things to be better ~ Esther Dyson_

**9:00 AM.**

I come here everyday, for a cup of coffee.

I prefer it with a couple of packets of cream and sugar, my ex-boyfriend Mike complained that it isn't even coffee, but I don't care.

I do this everyday, as I said before.

The same Starbucks at the end of the road, the same stressed faces disjointed by the cold.

Chicago always seems cold, except for parts of the winter and a the summer.

Today, I decide that I'm going to have my coffee black, black is brave, bold, courageous. All things in which I am not. I am stuck in a box of order, having the same job for 3 years, waking up at approximately seven o'four each morning.

I never divert my plans, because those plans are who I am.

The Barista boy is at the counter, pad in hand, he's always here ready to take my order.

He's cute enough, with his glasses, and brown eyes. He probably goes to Northwestern, he looks like the type.

As I ponder all of these things, I realize that I haven't ordered my coffee yet, I sigh, because it's not the same schedule that I'm accustomed to.

It feels good.

It feels nice.

Nice and good, and lovely, and freeing.

A new person strolls into the shop, he is disheveled and disorderly. He disrupts the order of everything, and all I can do is stare at the man who makes my world suddenly out of order, he calls me like a sweet song on a quiet night.

He smiles, carefree, and sits next to me. His grin takes up his whole face, not a care in the world.

"Hi," he says.

"Hello," I whisper back.

I never talk to anyone in Starbucks, I usually get my coffee and go.

Today, I decide, that I will be brave, different, strong.

The reason Mike and I broke up was because he said that I was 'too set in my ways' and that I was 'boring'.

I could be exciting and fearless, jovial and full of life.

He orders a cup of black coffee, and I do the same. We share secret smiles, we share a secret knowledge.

"Black, eh?" he tilts his head to me in curiosity.

"Black," I tell him confidently.

"You seem more like a cream and sugar kind of girl," he quips.

"How?" I wonder.

I'm genuinely curious as to why he thinks this of me.

Is it because I'm safe?

Is it because I am boring?

I don't want to be safe, I don't want to be boring. I want to be different, and I don't want to be burdened by the words that Mike spoke when he broke up with me anymore. I don't want to be burdened by a safe life, in which I live in regret because I wasn't brave enough to try something new.

"You just seem like a woman who likes order," he says, "your outfit, your hair, everything seems like how you want it. It must be killing you to sit here and not put cream in your coffee, to put your sugar in."

"I'm trying new things," I say simply.

"Why?" he is curious now.

"I don't know," I admit.

Our coffee arrives, two orders of black coffee, it sits on the table steaming hot. It taunts me like freshly baked bread through a window. It says that I am not worthy of being brave. I take the coffee and chug it down, my throat burns and I cough up the coffee.

The pretty man looks concerned, he pats my back. Then softly rubs me up and down.

It's electric, and I'm not used to strangers touching me. I like it.

"You just gulped down hot coffee," he states.

"I know," I roll my eyes.

"You are something...," he trails off, not knowing my name.

"Bella," I say, not Isabella, the name I usually use, "Bella is my name."

"Edward," he holds out his hand to shake.

"Nice to meet you, Edward," I smile, because he's pretty and nice, and his hand is warm in mine.

He gets up from his seat, and slurps his coffee quickly, some of it spills on his fancy shirt. The neat, orderly part of me wants to shriek in horror at how he doesn't seem to care that this shirt is ruined, but this new, brave me, giggles.

"You just spilled that all over yourself," I say, suddenly reaching for a napkin, wiping the access coffee off of him.

His face is flushed as he looks down, and we're close, so close.

His eyes are jade, with golden flecks. His hair is bronze and messy, his lips are red and pouty.

Simply put, he is very pretty.

Off puttingly pretty.

Crazy pretty.

I blush, realizing what I'm doing.

"Sorry, I just need to clean stains," I admit, not knowing why.

He just smirks, "thanks, Bella, I hope I see you again sometime," he says with a smile.

_I hope I see you too_, I think. You make me want to be brave.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Something simple, something different. I hope you like.

I don't own Twilight.

Change

_"We don't have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in the process of change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world." ~ Howard Zinn_

**9:45 AM**

I'm running later for work, I've never once been late, not in 3 years.

I run as fast as my feet can carry me into the office, arriving and probably sweating profusely from having to run all the way across town from Starbucks.

My boss isn't anywhere in sight, and so I make my way to my cubicle.

My job fits my life, boring, predictable, and completely done inside of a perfect little box. I come in and edit paperwork for my Seniors and then I go home, and I watch re-runs and old movies. Repeating the process everyday, 5 days a week.

I'm quite tired of my job, I hate it.

When I was in college, I dreamed of being a writer, publishing and doing all of these great things.

I began to ponder when my spirit died, where my ambition faltered.

As I park my ass in my chair, and begin to torturous duty of repetition, I hear a cough in the cubicle next to me.

A familiar smiling face, that familiar pretty face is smiling back at me.

"I guess we're seeing each other again much sooner than we thought, huh?" he says with enthusiasm, seeming genuinely excited to see me.

It makes me feel special, important, that I impacted someone's day.

"Yeah, it's great," I say with a small smile, "you made me late."

"I didn't make you late," he says playfully, "you're not even late."

"Yes, I am," I huff, "I was supposed to be here at nine-thirty, it is now nine-forty-five."

"I knew you were a coffee and cream type of person," he says, completely off topic.

He has me completely figured out.

I am the coffee and cream person. I'm the girl who sets out her clothes for each day of the week on Sunday night, and agonizes if my clothes aren't coordinated to my socks and shoes, and if my skirt is wrinkled, forget about it. Everything has to set the right day, or I just freak out.

It's hard to change, to get out of my little detailed box.

I'm working, very hard.

"I want to be a black coffee type of girl," I admit to him.

"I think that-," before he can respond, our boss comes over, a broad smile on her face.

"I see you've met our new associate Mr. Cullen," she says with a grin, and it doesn't escape me how her eyes are having sex with the man before her.

"We've met, yes," I say in my most professional voice.

"You'll be working closely, so I hope you like each other," she then proceeds to laugh in a way that she finds cute, she just sounds like a hyena.

"Bella and I were just getting acquainted, so I think we'll be fine," he brushes her off.

Our boss Irina leans over the table, old, forty-year-old boobs coming out of her shirt and in his face, "if you need _anything, _Mr. Cullen, I'm always available."

He doesn't notice, or doesn't care, because he just shrugs and starts to type out things on his computer. She gets the memo and leaves.

After she is gone, he turns to me and laughs.

A light boyish laugh, that makes me laugh as well. It's the type of laugh that fills a room with color.

It's the type of laugh that fills me with colors, all colors.

"Did our boss just pull the old bending her tits in my face trick?" he's so crass and I love it.

"I think she did just put her tits in your face," I say, I've never said words like that and again it feels nice.

"Women like that, they are too predictable," he tells me, "anyways, we better get these papers done."

"Yeah, definitely," I agree with him.

I smile to myself, thanking god that I have some change in this boring place.

This predictable life.

In less than an hour my life has completely gone off balance.

I was 15 minutes late for work, I laughed at my bosses callous display.

I have someone to talk to, and someone who is free.

Change has never been so freeing.

**I'm going to try and update every night, or at least every other night. Thanks for reading, if you're reading, lol.**


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Something simple, something different. I hope you like.

I don't own Twilight.

Change

_"The appearance of things change according to the emotions, and thus we see magic and beauty in them, while the magic and beauty are really in ourselves." ~ Kahlil Gibran_

**10:15 AM.**

After laughing about Irina's failed attempts at flirting, we chatted for a few minutes before we settled into a comfortable work silence. I was surprised at how easy it was to get along with someone that I'd barely known for an hour or so.

All that I knew for sure about the boy in the cubicle next to me was that he was very pretty.

His profile was excellent, and my staring was probably distracting.

I forced myself to be 'serious' about my work, typing furiously into my computer.

Concentrating profusely on a document, the document seemed as though it was written by a second grader.

Unfortunately, it was written by a thirty-year-old.

I sigh, sitting back in my seat for a minute, and then settling into a rhythm. I hear a tap on my cubicle wall, but decide to ignore it.

I hear the tap once more, and then a slight humming sound.

"Pssst, Bella," comes Edward's voice.

"Yeah?" I ask, half-heartedly.

"I'm bored," he moans, then pouts, then sighs.

He's behaving like a child, but the part of me that fawns over him finds it charming.

"Entertain yourself," I tell him swiftly.

"I am entertaining myself, by talking to you," he smiles, and then pushes his chair closer to me.

I wonder why he's so interested in someone so boring, I wonder what fascinates him.

It fascinates me.

"There's not much to say, we have to work," I tell him, "while at work, we work, when we go home, we do whatever we want."

"That sounds like a boring a miserable life," he says, and then swirls his chair.

"It's my life," I whisper.

My voice is quite low, I don't know if it's because I'm embarrassed to admit my life is like that, or to admit that he's right. I'm miserable and bored most of the time, because that's what I do.

"I'm sorry, Bella, I didn't mean to imply that your life is-"

I cut him off, holding my finger out to him. And then I laugh, I laugh for a long time, so long in fact that I don't even know why I'm laughing.

"What's so funny?" he asks me after awhile.

"You just described my life to a t," I admit, "it's fucking boring and miserable not having fun at working, reading this bullshit drivel and editing it to make it seem like it came out of Shakespeare's butthole."

"Shakespeare's butthole?" he cracks up, "that's kinky."

And suddenly, I'm laughing again. Giggling, blushing, flushing at him. I avert my eyes downward and then look up at Edward, who has stopped laughing.

"Yeah," I say, "kinky."

He flushes, gulps, and goes back to typing on his computer.

I can't seem to concentrate on my work anymore, going in between awful writing and daydreaming about the man in the cubicle next to me.

Vivid dreams of kinky things he'd do to me pass me by, and these are thoughts I hadn't had before.

Mike and I had sex of course, but Mike wanted to be adventurous, I just preferred to do the act, and then not think about it anymore. I was apparently boring in many ways, no wonder he dumped me.

My fingers click against the desk, as I lose my train of thought every-time I try to concentrate on my work.

I never, ever lost focus. I never, ever got distracted.

I could hear Edward humming a familiar tune, and I hummed it right back to him. Seemingly impressed, he turned to grin, wide, and big.

I'd only known him for an hour or so, but his smile was my quickly shooting up my favorite things list.

Not that that list was very long, unfortunately.

I was a bitter person, who didn't like many things.

I liked him though, and that was a change.

**Review if you like, tell me if you're digging it so far, or if you're not. **


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Something simple, something different. I hope you like.

I don't own Twilight.

Change

_"The adventure of life is to learn. The purpose of life is to grow. The nature of life is to change." ~ William Arthur Ward _

**11:30 AM.**

In the last couple of hours, I have learned that Edward can be very distracting, and also incredibly convincing.

I've only finished half of the world that I was supposed to, and I'm honestly not stressing about it. Who cares if I don't have this finished today? Well, maybe my employer does, and therefore I should, but I shouldn't get so worked up about it.

Life should be a bit fun for me, and work should be more fun.

I'm attempting to block out Edward's singing of 'We Are The Champions' in the cubicle next to mine, but instead I am giggling like a bumbling schoolgirl.

"Are you singing 'We Are The Champions'?" I ask with an amused smile.

"Yes," he says, proud.

"And why are you singing that?"

"Because...it's accurate to us."

"How is it accurate to us?" I furrow my eyebrows in confusion.

"I think that's pretty self explanatory, Bella," Edward says to me, "We're champions of our life, and we can do whatever the fuck we want with it, right?"

"I guess...," I mutter, attempting to distract myself with a folder on my desk.

"You don't sound so sure," he points out.

"I guess I'm not very sure, Edward," I tell him, swirling the chair around so that I could face him.

I wonder if Irina has noticed how much we are speaking, compared to how much we are working. I wonder if she is ignoring that fact and staring at the back of Edward's head just as I was doing. I wonder if she was born when 'We Are The Champions' first came out. She is pretty old.

Okay, that was pretty mean of me to say. I turn back to Edward who is watching me intently with his olive-green eyes.

"You're over thinking it," he points out, "you want me to give you an example?"

"Sure," I say, rolling my eyes.

"I'm hungry," Edward randomly points out.

"Lunch isn't until noon, Edward," I roll my eyes once more, what did him being hungry have to do with anything.

"Point proved," he says, whistling.

"How am I proving your point, Edward? Lunch is always at noon, everyone in the office knows this and abides by it," I huff, I could handle the whole slacking off of work thing, but disrupting order to lunch was just a no-no, to be honest.

"You really think everyone follows that rule, Bella?" he asks me, a devilish smirk spread across his face.

"Yes, everyone, including myself follows it," I'm confident that I am right.

"Then why is that lady over there," he points to Jessica, another associate, and kind of a bimbo, leaving early for lunch, "leaving?"

"Jessica always sneaks out early for lunch," I brush him off.

He swirls his chair until his back is to his desk, and his eyes follow the quiet room until they land upon something he sees right. Then he turns back towards me, and a huge grin encompasses his whole face.

That grin was now number one on my favorite things list, ahead of everything, including books.

"Your boss does too, apparently," he says pointing to Irina.

She was standing by the door with a much younger co-worker, her icy blonde hair pulled up into a bun. She had something in her hands, and it appeared as though she were leaving for lunch. That didn't make sense, because she implemented the whole 'I don't have lunch until noon, so my associates must wait until noon' bullshit.

I averted my eyes to the floor, then back to Edward. He was right, it was such a silly thing to worry so much about what time I ate lunch.

"Edward?" I ask.

"Yes, Bella?" he responds.

"Let's get the fuck out of here and get some lunch, I'm hungry as well."

"That's the spirit, Bella," he grabs my arm, as grab my coat off the chair.

He pulls me out of the office and into the fresh air.

It's a really sunny and beautiful day outside, and surprisingly it's not too cold outside, just a bit chilly. You could see birds in the trees, and clouds in the sky, it was nice.

"Beautiful day, huh?" Edward asks.

"Very beautiful," I murmur.

Edward leads me to the side of the building, and quickly stops in front of what appears to be a motorcycle. A tough looking one, probably one that belongs to a biker guy, those guys that hang around shady bars and speed in the wrong lanes of the highway.

"So, where's your car?" I ask him all of a sudden.

"This is it," he points to the motorcycle.

"You've got to be kidding me, how old are you?" I ask him, laughing because I just couldn't believe it.

"I'm twenty-fucking-five, Bella," and then he struts to the motorcycle, "how old are you?"

"I'm twenty-six," I admit, I feel fucking old.

"If you're thinking you're old, you're not," he smirks, knowingly, "but you're going to prematurely age if you don't have a little fun in life, you'll be sixty before you're thirty."

I think about the words he says, and admit to myself that he's right. I could get on his motorcycle, and have lunch early. As long as he had proper safety equipment on the motorcycle, such as a helmet.

I take one step, and then another, and then another, and finally, I hop on it behind him. Wrapping my arms securely around his middle.

"Edward?"

"Yes?"

"You wouldn't happen to have a helmet would you?" I ask him, biting my lip nervously.

"Of course I have helmets," he says, pulling two helmets out. A bright red one and a neon blue one.

"Those helmets are very...," I trail off.

"Patriotic?" he asks, "_America, _bitches."

I giggle, "yes, America, bitches."

We put on our helmets and drive off, to god knows where, but at least I knew that we were getting food.

I felt young, I felt kind of wild, and I felt free.

**Chapter delay, I was watching the KCA's last night. Partly because I love Kristen Stewart, and partly because I have a seven-year-old little sister, and ten-year-old little brother, and as the big sister, it's my duty to watch it with them every year. They voted for Kristen, I taught them right, oh yeah.**

**Anyways, review if you want. I just hope you're liking the story. :)**


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Something simple, something different. I hope you like.

I don't own Twilight.

Change

_"It is a mistake for anyone to think he has lived too long in his old, unsatisfactory ways to make the great change. If you switch on the light in a dark room, it makes no difference how long it was dark because the light will still shine." ~ Vernon Howard_

**12:00 PM.**

Instead of immediately catching lunch at some random cafe, Edward decides to drive us all around town in his scary motorcycle.

Surprisingly, I've never felt more alive. The air blowing through my hair, the wind in my pores, the way my heart beat escalated at every stop, and the strong and soothing warmth of Edward's toned back. I would rest my cheek there, right at the point where his shoulder met the arm, and rub my face against it, breathing in his scent.

It was as silly thing, to be on a motorcycle, but focusing on what Edward smelled liked.

I was torn between man, and man. He just smelled all _man._

And I just couldn't get enough, it was perfection. I was kind of disappointed when he finally stopped at an unrecognizable Latin Cafe on the other side of the city.

The smell of fresh food cooking permeated the entire street, salsa music playing, women and children dancing in complete joy.

As though unaware of their surroundings, unaware of the cruelties of the world.

I envied them a little bit.

Edward turns to face me, he is smiling once more as he watches an older woman take a little boy and tuck him under her arms.

"Where are we?" I ask him, curiously. "I've never been here before..."

He's still watching the two dance, his eyes enraptured, and then he turns to me, "I've never actually been here before, but I heard about this place."

"You're taking me to a restaurant that you've never been to? How did you even hear of this place?" I ask him.

I'm completely baffled because I never go to restaurants without checking them out beforehand, making sure that they have a history of being clean, what their rank is, order time, and all of that. A simply google search goes a long way for me, or Siri.

Although Siri doesn't help much when I want to find the mall.

Edward just laughs at me, "Come on, Bella, live a little!"

"I am living, I just rode a motorcycle!" I yell at him, almost bragging.

"If you've ridden a motorcycle, you can eat lunch at a new place," he smiles reassuringly, he leans down a bit so that his tall frame is down to my height, his eyes on level with mine.

He brushes his hands over my cheeks and to my head, he then proceeds to take off my helmet. At that point, I think I've forgotten how to breathe, might heart my pop out of my chest from overstimulating heartbeats, and my cheeks are dark scarlet with my blush, my mouth gaping open like a fish.

When I don't speak, he does once more.

"Bella?" he asks, snapping his fingers in front of my face.

"Alright, we'll go in," I sigh, heavily.

We go in, and it's not even what I imagined. There is a long bar that is dark wooden and stretches around the restaurant. There are bar stools that line it, and a grill behind the bar. Inside there is a place to dance, and young couples are dancing wildly. Edward looks at me curiously and quirks his eyebrows at me, as if expecting me to take the dance floor.

_No, buddy_, I think to myself, _you'll get me to cross the busiest part of the city with my tits out before I dance in some new, strange restaurant._

Edward takes the hint, and we stand there for a few minutes just taking in the place. Edward moving closer and closer to me.

His hand resting on the small of my back, the side of his body, all of it's warmth against my side.

A young waitress comes over to us, and she gives Edward a similar look that our boss Irina did.

Only she's not forty.

Not to be ageist, but Irina is pretty damn old, or maybe I just hate her, or both.

The waitress is young, with olive skin, and long, flowly, dark hair.

"My name is Carmen, and I'll be acting as your waitress and hostess," she says, leading us to a private table in the back.

She never takes her eyes off of Edward, he never takes his eyes off of me, and I never take my eyes off of him.

Once we are sitting down, she pulls out a pad and a fancy looking pen to write our orders down.

"What would you like, handsome?" she winks at him, I want to kick her.

"Just the grilled lobster tail and the organic vegetables, and some coke," he says, "what about you, Bella?"

He says my name, so softly, almost as though it's a term of endearment. I think I hear Carmen scoff.

"I'll just have what he's having," I breathe, because the way he's looking at me makes me forget Carmen, this restaurant, or even the date in which I was born.

Carmen thanks us for our orders and promises to have them out in a timely manner.

She walks away almost angrily, but still walking in a way that would be perceived as 'sultry'.

When she leaves, Edward takes my hands in his and inspects them, his green eyes brighten as though he's found a secret in them that I haven't seen. Even though I've had these hands for well, my entire life. It amazes me, how someone who has lived a quarter century could have so much wonder still, not jaded by the world or it's disappointments. He's the most interesting person I've ever met.

He's given me three very interesting hours, and the best day of my life - so far.

"Your hands are beautiful," he murmurs.

"Thanks," I say with a blush.

"You don't believe me, but they are," he explains, "your hands say a lot about the type of person you are."

"And what do mine say?" I ask, curiously.

"They say a lot of things, mostly that you are afraid of change, you live your life in a box, and also, they say that you are kind of fearless," he smirks, he lets my hands go.

I feel disappointed because his warmth is not there anymore.

"How do they say that I'm fearless?" I'm genuinely curious.

"Your nail polish color is different on each hand," he points out.

I'd forgotten that I'd painted one hand _Sail Away _blue, and the other hand was _Riveting _from the Hunger Games collection.

They were both so pretty, and I couldn't decide which, so I decided on both. It wasn't a conforming decision, and I realized in that moment that I could be interesting and fun. Even if it was in such a small way.

"I couldn't decide on a color," my face is so red at this point, "so I decided on both."

"And here you think you're boring," he teases.

Carmen comes with our food, slapping it on the table with our drinks. Then she leaves.

"Well, Carmen can forget about her big tip," Edward says with a laugh once she is out of hearing distance.

"Carmen can forget a lot of things," I dig.

"I don't see her at all," he tells me, "I see women like Carmen and Irina all the time, there's barely any of those damn Bella's."

"Is that a bad thing?" I ask him, because I'm curious, and also really flattered.

Also, I'm fist pumping that he's not into such an obviously pretty girl like the waitress, and that he looks at no one but me.

"No," he smiles, "you think that you're boring, but you were the most beautiful and interesting thing I saw in that coffee shop."

"Okay, Romeo, you can stop now," I joke.

Edward just laughs and digs into his lobster.

We eat, and we laugh, we actually do more laughing than eating. Edward likes to make funny faces at me, and also likes to make his lobster's talk before he eats them. It's childish, innocent, and incredibly cute.

We talk about everything, and nothing at all.

It's the most fun I've ever had, I forget about work, about Mike, about my dreadful life.

I'm just here in the moment, with him, with Edward.

He gets me to dance with him, to music I've never heard of. Even though my dancing is awkward, and clumsy, he's encouraging and sweet.

I never would have danced if it were anyone else.

By the time we leave, I feel full and sated.

We're standing outside of the cafe, in front of his motorcycle. He doesn't make a move and neither do I. Even though we have to head back to work soon, even though we probably should leave. It's just quiet contentment for us.

"Thank you," I say, suddenly.

"For what?" he asks, eyebrows lifting.

"For...this day, it was fun," the side of my mouth lifts into a small smile.

"It was my pleasure," he tells me.

He wraps his arm around me, and kisses my forehead. It makes me melt a little bit into the sidewalk, and we just stand there.

I bask in it, because it feels nice.

Change settles in my heart and mind, and even though I don't know him well, I feel as though I couldn't imagine life without him.


End file.
